The Craftswomen
MERVI PASANEN
Master Crafter & Author, Medieval, Finnish Iron Age & Viking Era, Lahti, Finland
Mervi says she “LARPs” her day job as a newspaper journalist and is a craft specialist with a focus on Medieval, Finnish Iron Age and Viking Era clothing as her true calling and passion. Mervi collaborates with archaeologists all over Scandinavia to identify and recreate textiles found in Iron Age graves. Her deep understanding of thousand year old crafts - particularly Finnish tablet weavings - and her general curiosity fine-tuned by her career as a journalist has given her the most precise set of skills to do this work. Mervi has written several books on the topic and has dedicated to openly sharing her knowledge with others, keeping the know-how alive for future generations.
She recently completed a project based on a never-before found textile in the Tampere area informed by DNA samples. Starting from scratch, she sourced local wool and hand-spun, plant-dyed, wove and sewed the piece into existence for an Ancient DNA exhibition at the Vapriikki Museum in Tampere, Finland.
HANNA NORE
Master Traditional Tanner, Author & Educator, Kemiönsaari, Finland
Hanna is committed to using traditional and sustainable techniques as an alternative to toxic industrial methods and she teaches anyone else who wants to learn the same. Now with over 16 years of teaching and her books, she has single-handedly revived an almost-lost traditional profession. Hanna’s reverent and gentle handling of the materials is something you may not expect to find in this space but it is a primary value that drives her work. Skins and furs are often cast away to be waste and to go through meticulous, time-consuming and physically-demanding work to process them is a way to honor their life and create them anew. She handles the closeness to death, to blood and guts, with the most beautiful grace and sense of responsibility.
She’s recently been tasked with a very important challenge: a group of women reindeer herders are traveling down to her workshop on the Finnish archipelago from above the arctic circle to learn alternative tanning methods. Since the pandemic drastically disrupted the market by creating a surplus of reindeer meat and hides, the price for them is at an all time low and families whose livelihoods rely on reindeer are finding new ways to diversify. Though they have a vital practice of working with reindeer hides, they are now seeking to innovate upon their existing knowledge in the hopes to keep their ways of life relevant for the future…
HANNA PIIPPONEN
Master Shoemaker, Traditional Karelian & Modern Designs, Tuupovaara, Finland
Hanna’s small village in eastern Finland is the sort of small town with one restaurant and one grocery store - where everyone knows everyone. After years of formal study and apprenticeship, she inherited her sun-bathed studio and all of its precious machines and tools from Marti, the shoemaker that was there for decades before her. Bringing her background as a fine artist and clear creative voice, she’s made it her own. Honoring her heritage, Hanna focuses on Karelian-style shoes with their iconic upturned toe - that she sews by hand with pitch thread she prepares herself from linen thread and sticky pine resin (pitch) and threaded with wild board bristle. Making shoes the old fashioned way takes perseverance and dedication. Through her quiet yet powerful presence, Hanna expresses that tenfold. Hanna trusts that there is a place for traditional techniques in a modern world - she feels through her craft it’s her responsibility to keep that spirit alive.
HELI KARMAKALLIO
Artisan of Ancient Techniques, Turku, Finland
Feeling out of place in a traditional university, Heli enrolled in Finland’s only Artisan of Ancient Techniques program in Raisio, Finland and something started to shift: “When you’re sitting with others teaching your hands to do these ancient crafts, something happens. There are no mirrors, you don’t see yourself. It’s just your hands working and in deep focus for hours. Your sense of self dissolves into the group and into the raw materials.” Craft offers a holistic experience often lacking in our digitally-dominated modern world. Working with one’s hands harmonizes the whole human: unifying intellect, heart and hand. In Heli’s community, young people are turning towards craft as a way to connect and express their creativity and curiosity beyond the world of screens. Now, as a graduate of the Ancient Techniques program, Heli is enthusiastically pursuing a career as an Artisan of Ancient Techniques working at the Lofotr Viking Center in northernmost Norway.
